Your new path to enlightenment...

I've decided that I want to be like Confucius and start my own -ism, Dannyanism, and start open up a new path to enlightenment. So like Confucius, I'm gonna guide everyone down that path toward enlightenment through vague little sayings, limericks, poems and stories. Get what you want out of it.


Dannyanism Proposition of Enlightenment #72: Sometimes when your brushing your teeth and your brother announces that he just used your toothbrush to clean the ball that he plays fetch with the dog with, you just gotta keep brushing and finish up.

How in the world did I get myself into this situation?

I've come to the realization that I live to ask myself this question. Now, I don't mean asking it in the negative way, like when I'm facing the consequences for doing something wrong or stupid, but when I end up in doing something amazing, awesome, strange and/or completely surreal, just by taking going out and doing things. I am by no means a daredevil, but I love adventure, I love seeing and experiencing things that few others have ever done before.

Over the past month I've been reading the book, Yes Man, by Danny Wallace (yes that stupid Jim Carrey movie is based off it, but the book is way way way different). In the book he decides to say Yes to everything for 6 months, and it leads him on some absolutely crazy adventures, that he normally wouldn't have gone on, and changes his life in the process. This is the way I want to lead my life. Not necessarily saying yes to everything, because sometimes you just have to say no, but saying yes to things that I normally wouldn't say yes to.

Last year, my trip to China was a prime example of a time where I said yes to something I would normally say no to, citing lack of means to go. Now, I am definitely paying for it now, having no savings and a bit of a credit card bill, but I wouldn't change it for the world. Who else can say that they hiked the Great Wall of China and camped out on one of the towers? I personally know of only 8 or 9 other people (because they were with me). Or, who can say they once stood on a street corner in Beijing with a box full of cats, and then went for nachos later on that night? I can only think of one, and he was with me at the time (that was a pretty weird moment in life, huh, Chris).

Either way, I loved the fact that while I was doing each of those things I was able to ask myself, "How in the world did I get myself in this situation?" And just smile.

What to do when the Reester Bunny drops an egg in your basket...

So every once in a while I stumble across a product or advertisement that in trying to be clever completely misses the boat and becomes unintentionally hilarious. Winter semester last year, I was in a Theories of Persuasion class, and for one assignment we were required to bring in examples of advertising that just didn't work. The best example was an ad for Pringles Bold that had a bull with Pringles exploding out his nose. Now I don't know about you, but bull snot flavored potato chips don't exactly sound appealing. Neither do these:


My mom and brother told me about these and I immediately had to go out and buy me some. Now I don't know about where you come from but our wonderful friends at Urban Dictionary (a useful tool to figure out just what the crap some people are talking about and to understand those dirty slang words) define the word reasty as dirty, funky, rotten, disgusting. mountain slang derived from combining raunchy and yeasty. Now in my household and with my friends a reaster was a nasty fart. So when I hear Reester Bunny, I'm gonna giggle.

Nevada's Johnson... Really??

So, this last weekend I went home to visit family. As many already know, I used to work for the newspaper up in Logan as a copy editor. I hated the job and only lasted about 3 months. As a copy editor, I would layout the paper, edit the story and then write the headline. So imagine my delight when I opened up Sunday's paper and read this:



Now, I may have not been the best copy editor around, but I'm not an idiot. I know what is implied by stating something like, "Nevada's Johnson." I guess what worries me the most about this headline is that they let me go because I just wasn't cutting it. There's nothing like finding out that the people who think you aren't good enough for them are complete and total morons.

My brother is sending the letter to The Tonight Show. So watch Jay Leno on Monday's for the next few weeks to see if it makes it.

Rated R

The movie rating system is broken. Over the past few days, this has been weighing on my mind, mainly because so many people really rely on the movie ratings to decide whether to go see a film or not, especially members of the Church.

This bothers me.

And not only because people could be missing out on a great film due to an unjust rating. When a person uses the movie rating system as their main criteria on whether they should watch a movie, they essentially allow someone else to decide whether they should watch a movie. They don't really decide for themselves.

You have to realize every movie that is rated by the MPAA is rated by a panel and it is NOT a unanimous decision, it is a majority vote. This means that the PG-13 movie you are watching could very well have had 3 votes saying R, and 4 votes saying PG-13.

Also in deciding what rating a movie should receive, there is no set criteria. Many assume that if there any more than two F-words and it will get an R-rating. Or that if the F-word is used sexually it will automatically get an R-rating.

WRONG. I could give you a rather long list of PG-13 movies that have more than two F-bombs in it and even more that use it in a sexual manner. In fact, I could name a few PG movies that have the F-word in them.

Nothing bothers me more than when someone walks out of the theater and says, "That movie should have been rated R." Which I heard a lot of people say after watching The Dark Knight.

My response to that statement is, "No, YOU should have done your research before hand, and decided whether that movie adheres to your standards, rather than assuming that because it was PG-13 it would be okay."

Don't ever put your standards in the hands of others.

Now I'm not advocating going out and watching everything an anything to make an informed decision. And I'm not saying ignore the rating system completely, because it is a great starting point. But go out and research the movie before hand. With the Internet these days, we have the tools to go out and properly know what is in a movie beforehand (like this site.)

Don't just go out and see any PG-13 rated movie just because it's not R-rated. And don't write of an R-rated movie just because it's rated R, you might be missing out on something great because a few random people on a committee decided there was just too much violence or drug references in the movie.

Here are some R-rated movies that probably didn't deserve their rating.


Brick - This movie isn't very well known but it is a wonderful independent movie. There is almost no swearing in the entire movie, and very little violence, and no sex. It got it's R-rating because the movie talks about drugs. It doesn't show any actual drug use, and it's references are nothing more than what you would see on prime-time television.

The Matrix - This one is pretty well known for being unjustly rated. There is very little swearing, or sex, and the violence is no worse than what is on television. One rumor that has floated around is that it got it's rating due to the scene where they storm the building in black trench coats, but that's only a rumor.

The Ghost and the Darkness - This is another movie with very little swearing and sex, but has a couple violent lion attack scenes, but again is nothing worse than what you would see on network television. In fact I'm pretty sure I've seen crazier more violent stuff on CSI.







3:10 to Yuma - Another really good movie. Much like the previous films, the movie has very little language at least no more than what is in a PG-13 movie, but got it's R-rating for violence that would go unedited on television.




Slumdog Millionaire - This is a movie that I really fear many won't see because of the rating. It's an amazing movie, and will probably get a post of it's own just because of how it affected me. But in the movie, there is again very little sex and swearing, and while the rating says it's because of graphic violent images, the violence is no more graphic than network television. It's a fantastic movie and I'll talk about it more when I go see it again.

In the end, be your own judge, inform yourself. No one knows your standards better than you. Take heed of what the For Strength of Youth Pamphlet now tells us, "You have the gift of the Holy Ghost, which will give you strength and help you make good choices."

Random name for a band...

Static Muffin

This made me laugh, and I don't know why.



I can only hope that someday I'll be sitting in a diner, look out the window and see that.

Something new to listen to today

Finding cool, new or different music is kind of a hobby of mine (half my hard drive is just music). So ever other day or so I'm gonna post something that I'm currently listening to, something I've discovered recently, or just something I like, for everyone to hear.


Today, we got K'Naan. I actually found this guy while watching those stupid shows on MTV, like Room Raiders or Next or some other "reality show". Remember when they used to actually have Music on MTV... such a golden time. Anyways during the credits they actually show music from up coming artists, most of who suck, but this dude caught my eye, and he made it to my iPod. It's some great stuff, a good mix of hip-hop, reggae, rock and just overall goodness.

Celebrity feud of the day...

I loves me a good celebrity feud, and the more ridiculous the better. It really provides me with some meaning to my life, only a little though. The feud for today has been brewing since the Grammy's few weeks ago. It involves a Disney Channel darling with legions of pre-pubescent girls willing to lay down their lives for her, and a British rock band with legions of disenfranchised Generation X-ers willing to lay down their lives for them. I give you:

In the red corner at probably 100 lbs or less: MILEY CYRUS



(What you don't see are the knives she's holding behind her back don't be charmed by that smile, she be deadly)

And in the blue corner at a combined weight of around 500 lbs. (but each still probably only 100 lbs or less): RADIOHEAD



(Right there Thom Yorke is getting ready to Crane Kick Miley Cyrus in the head Karate Kid style, an unstoppable maneuver, at least in the first movie)

Here's the thing, I'm gonna have to give this one to Miley, because of her fan base. Not only are the millions of 13-year old girls absolutely bat-crap crazy, but so are their SUV driving soccer moms who buy them tickets to see Miss Hannah Montana in concert, they are the true scary ones. You don't wanna be on the bad side of a blonde white chick in an Escalade, she will take you out.

Plus as mentioned before, while much like Ms. Montana, Radiohead has legions of fans willing to lay down their lives for them, laying down their lives just means probably committing suicide, leaving the band high and dry.

It would take a comeback of epic proportions for Radiohead to win.

Old age at 27?

So I found this, this morning. As if I didn't need any other reasons to feel super old, finding out that some of my friends were 10 years younger than me did that real fast, apparently already a year into my old age.



But you 22-year old young bucks better stop laughing, seeing as you've just hit your peak, and it's all down hill from here.

Just the beginning

So I've been meaning to start my blog for a while now but have been pretty lazy and unmotivated.  Hopefully this new found motivation will keep with me so I don't have one of those pathetic blogs with just a few posts every couple of months.